Omnipotent control
Immature defence (listed as omnipotence at the minor image-distorting level of the DSM-IV scale); primary in McWilliams' scheme. The person feels and acts as if they can control people and outcomes at will, treating others as extensions of their own will.
What drives it
Wards off helplessness: as long as I'm moving the pieces, I can't be hurt, surprised or made dependent. Outmanoeuvring others gives a characteristic thrill, what McWilliams calls the pleasure of getting away with it.
How it shows
Work
Micromanagement framed as standards. Manipulation for its own sake, even where a straight request would work. Visible pleasure in outmanoeuvring colleagues. Refusal to accept that a market, a board or a team member has a will of its own: “I'll make them see it.” Others feel like pieces on a board.
Relationships
Controls money, schedules and information; can't tolerate a partner's independent plans; treats surprises as insubordination. In milder form, magical thinking: if I worry enough, nothing bad will happen.
Self
A rush of satisfaction from steering someone without their knowing. Disproportionate rage or panic when something happens that you didn't sanction.
What tells it apart
Illusion of control: Illusion of control is a mild, common misjudgment about chance events; omnipotent control drives behaviour toward people and shows in manipulation and rage at their independence.
Coercive control: Coercive control is a pattern of domination in a relationship, often with threats and isolation; omnipotent control is the inner defence and can appear with no coercion at all, as in magical thinking.
Conscientiousness: A conscientious manager controls tasks and relaxes when standards are met; omnipotent control is aimed at people and never relaxes, because the target is helplessness, not quality.
A test
Watch their reaction when someone acts independently and it turns out well; relief or indifference rules it out, while irritation that the outcome wasn't theirs confirms it.
Questions to carry
- When someone acts on their own and it turns out well, how does the person react?
- Where do I need to be the one moving the pieces, and what happens when I’m not?
How strong the research is
clinical. A clinical concept from object-relations theory; overlaps with researched constructs such as Machiavellianism but has not been tested as a defence.
Where it comes from
Melanie Klein, 1946; Nancy McWilliams, 1994
On the family tree: Melanie Klein